Theresa, are you sure you'll be exhausted? I usually land in the early afternoon and get to Umbria quickly and not tired; for info, I'm 54.

The essential thing is to avoid taking the useless train in to Rome; go to Orte straight from the little station at the airport -- and buy your entire ticket at the window there: at most a 3-minute wait.

No link Letizia -- Trenitalia has not been useful for me -- but the route is an FS route, and is listed as "M70", a metropolitan route, in the printed FS schedule (2004) in front of me.

The line runs from Fiumicino Aeroporto to Roma Trastevere, Ostiense, not Termini, Tuscolana, Tiburtina, Nomentana, various small places, among which Settebagni; most of them terminate at Fara Sabina, which is of no use at all to the traveller going to Umbria or Tuscany, but 16 of them run the whole route from the airport to Orte, usually leaving at 57 past the hour, sometimes at 27 past. The earliest at 0557 (arrival Orte 0759), the latest at 2057 (arrival 2259).

For people going to Umbria or Tuscany, the commonest mistake -- and I still saw it recommended on this site in a recent trip report -- is to go into Rome (unnecessary, much more expensive, and time-consuming), then wrestle with the lines to get tickets there, etc. The Orte route is the simplest, fastest, and cheapest; especially for Umbria, all the more so that some of those trains out of Umbria, you still have to change in Orte!

Curious, I went to the Trenitalia site. The line is there; you just have to enter "Fiumicino Aeroporto" in full. The schedules they give you also list many other Fiumicino departures with changes at Tiburtina, that interleave between the 16 direct ones I mentioned.

You're a sweetheart Theresa, but I have only two or three strings to my bow, and you bumbled on one of them; I harp on it endlessly, because it really is a useful tip.

So here goes, again: when you get off your plane, you go to the train station, as everybody does who's not renting cars or the rare few taking buses.

When you're in that train station, you have to go to the ticket window to take a train. The fact that 99% of "everybody" is mindlessly going on that crowded train to Rome at the grossly inflated prices, doesn't oblige you to do the same, and that very same window is a full-service window completely capable of issuing a ticket say from Aosta to Bari, or an abbonamento (monthly pass) from Caserta to Venice. The guys don't like it much, don't expect it, and even attempt to resist, but they have to sell them to you if you ask them.

So you go there, and ask for a ticket "Fiumicino ad Assisi per Orte senza passare per Roma". You will be delivered a ticket from the airport to Assisi. (I'm simplifying just a tiny bit now, since they now deliver you 2 tickets for some reason, covering the whole trip, but the principle is the same.)

The waiting time is next to nil.

You don't spend the umpteen euros for the brief trip into Rome. (The train to Rome is specially priced, at an expensive price, to soak foreign visitors: whereas the rest of the rail system is highly subsidized.)

The trains to Orte always have seats (the Rome train is standing room only if you get onboard towards the end of the wait for it).

You don't have to negotiate the crowded station in Rome.

You don't have to change trains in the large crowded train station in Rome. The station in Orte is 4 platforms and no crowds at all.

You don't have to wait in horrid lines, up to 45 minutes, to buy your ticket in Rome (the automatic ticket machines sometimes work, and sometimes don't; especially if you're going to an odd final destination: you'll go thru the whole process, and the screen will then tell you sorry, we can't do this here, go to a ticket window).

And many trains from Rome to Umbria involve changing in Orte anyway: so you get to Orte directly instead of with a change in Rome.

***
So: go to the window, buy your ticket. Go to Orte (the platform on the left -- the one on the right is where everybody else will be sheepfully trotting). Times are quite plainly posted.

At the little station in Orte, video monitors and track monitors, as well as paper schedules (tabelloni) list the trains out. The line is usually Ancona, with change in Foligno, and often the change in Foligno is cleverly scheduled, and short, to accommodate Assisi visitors: after all Assisi is a very common destination.

(I'll admit that there is a line to Assisi that goes direct from Rome instead: Rome to Florence via Foligno, Spello, Assisi, Perugia, Terontola. It's far less frequent than the Orte-Ancona lines, though; if you decide to take it, you still buy your entire thru-ticket at the little station at the airport. And it still goes thru Orte! so you can catch it from Orte, which you will get to earlier than if you went to Rome.)

Theresa, I hope you weren't planning on arriving in Italy with no local money. My own rule of thumb is the equivalent, in cash, of about $100 US before ever landing: ya never know what may happen.

Cost: not much. My diary for Feb. 25, 2004 reports 9.65 euro for Rome-Orte-Terni. Assisi would be a bit more, maybe a total of 15E.

(I have a feeling you're worrying too much.... Make sure you have a bit of cash, and buy your ticket when you get there: you'll have to anyway. Millions of people do it every day after all, it's set up to be easy: relax!)

Yes.

Orte is at the junction of two important lines: Rome-Florence and Rome-Ancona. Anything on those lines goes thru Orte; and Orte, you get to direct from the airport.

On those lines: Orvieto, Chiusi, Arezzo; Narni, Terni, Spoleto, Trevi, Foligno; and other destinations in Tuscany and Umbria.

Not on the lines, but a change from them: Todi, Perugia, Spello, Assisi, Gubbio, Siena; every other destination in Umbria; many other destinations in Tuscany.

A graphic makes it crystal-clear:

Round and round.... From the airport, you can only go direct to Rome and Orte (and some minor places N of Rome, that are almost never useful for the tourist).

You change in Orte. If you go to Rome, you change in Rome. The difference is that the change in Orte is faster, cheaper, and far less crowded; and sometimes the train from Rome still requires a change in Orte, making 2 changes instead of one.

The Orte train schedules, like all the other FS train schedules, are online at Trenitalia.

Colleen, that's the same schedule (of course) as the Trenitalia schedule. (If others aren't getting a page, the link is actually here.)

How can you tell the schedule is no good for you, though? (Unless you're coming in on a Sunday or holiday, when every 2 hours does look a bit thin; or of course very late in the afternoon when you may not have the time to get to Umbria by nightfall.) It's impossible to predict when you'll clear the entry formalities and baggage claim.

There are definitely one, and maybe two, hotels in Orte. The definite one is the Calù, which I misreported last year on this board as having shut its doors, but I saw it (or rather its caffé-bar) open this spring, and just to check, even went and asked the barman, he confirmed, yes, it's open. It's right across from the little station, and very convenient. On the other hand, I'd hardly recommend it as an intro to Umbria: it's like a 1960s YMCA. (Diary, Nov. 15, 1998, Sep. 21, 2000.)

The Calù is at Piazza Giovanni XXIII (Orte Scalo) — just the name for the square in front of the station — phone 761-40-0147.

The simplest thing, in view of your husband's low resistance, is to overnite in Rome.